Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/Williams, Alfred
WILLIAMS, ALFRED (1832–1905), Alpine painter, born at Newark-on-Trent on 4 May 1832, was youngest of the three sons of Charles Williams [q. v.], a congregational minister, by his wife Mary Smeeton. Frederick Smeeton Williams [q. v.] was a brother. Alfred was educated firstly at a private school and subsequently at University College School, London. He learnt drawing at a private academy and landscape painting of William Bennett (1811–1871), water-colour artist. As a young man he supported himself by drawing on wood for book illustrations. From 1849 to 1856 he illustrated publications of the Religious Tract Society and of Messrs. Cassell & Company, as well as his brother Frederick's ‘Our Iron Roads’ (1852); he also for a time was assistant to Sir John Gilbert [q. v. Suppl. I].
From 1854, when he made an extended walking tour in Northern Italy and Switzerland, his interest in painting centred in mountain scenery. In 1861 he settled at Salisbury, and founding there the maltster's business afterwards known as Williams Brothers, was engaged in trade until his retirement in 1886. Meanwhile, during the summer months he travelled, chiefly in Switzerland, pursuing his art, which occupied him wholly after his retirement. In 1878 he was elected a member of the Alpine Club. His subjects were chiefly drawn from the Alps and the mountains of Scotland, but in 1900–1 he spent twelve months in India. At the Alpine Club, exhibitions of his water-colour drawings were held in March 1889, of his Indian paintings in 1902, and again of water-colours from 5 to 23 Dec. 1905. Between 1880 and 1890 he exhibited four works at the Royal Academy, one at the Royal Society of British Artists, and one at the New Gallery. He was skilful in rendering the effect of sunlight on distant snow and in giving an impression of the size of great mountains. One of his water-colour drawings, ‘Monte Rosa at Sunrise from above Alagna,’ is in the Victoria and Albert Museum; another belongs to the corporation of Salisbury, and two to the Alpine Club.
He died at the Grand Hôtel, Ste. Maxime-sur-Mer, Var, France, on 19 March 1905, and was buried at Ste. Maxime. He married twice: (1) in 1863 Sarah, daughter of George Gregory of Salisbury, by whom he had no issue; and (2) in 1866 Eliza (d. 1892), daughter of William Walker of Northampton, by whom he had one son and one daughter.
[Information from Mr. Sidney S. Williams; pref. to cat. of Exhibition at Alpine Club in 1905; Graves, Dict. of Artists; Cat. of Water-colours, Victoria and Albert Museum.]